Altars of Reconciliation, features work by three Native artists Bobby C. Martin (Muscogee Creek), Erin Shaw (Chickasaw-Choctaw), and Tony Tiger (Sac & Fox, Muscogee, Seminole). Their work wrestles and reckons with the history of colonization of Native tribes in the South-Eastern part of the United States, the role Christianity played it that history, and how the artists, who are Christians, have reconciled their faith, their history, and their identity.

(We will be closed for Christmas from December 23-January 6th).

We will have a Dovetail event for this show on Tuesday, January 28, 2025 from 6-8pm, and we will have more info and the link to register for that up soon.

Curated by CIVA

UPCOMING EXHIBITIONS

PAST EXHIBITIONS

Gallery hours : T-F -> 10:30am - 4:30pm & Sat. 12 - 6pm

Featuring visual and written works by, Sarah Armbrust, Lisa Asagi, Sarah Bernhardt, Morgan Johnson Burton, Diane Bush, Katie Calfee, Tiia Corzine, Debra Disman, Susan Ferguson, St. Francis of Assisi, Jenny Gastler, Katherine Gastler, Ross Gay, Teresa I Getty, Patrick Greenwald, Michelle Gomez, Sarah Guthrie, Melissa Gwyn, Ellie Harold, John Hendrix, Bryce Holt, Jean Howard, Kelly Kruse, Jill Katherine Kuanfung, Jill Kyong, Bernadette Lamb, Sara Maichel, Lori Marble, Grace McGinnis, Brian Mitchell, Henry Moyerman, Mary-Jo Okawa, Mary Oliver, April Parviz, Benjamin Parviz, Stone Peng, Delaney Rogers, Delro Rosco, Rachel Rose, Théa Rosenburg, Gary Rubin, Christina Schempf, Friedrich Schiller, Stephen Schubert, Michelle Schwengel-Regala, Peg Shaw, Camille Silverman, Ted Washington, Hannah Wieting, and Taylor Yocom

EVIDENCE OF JOY EXHIBITION CATALOG:

Curated by April Parviz

Instructions for living a life: 

Pay attention. 

Be astonished. 

Tell about it.

—Mary Oliver  

Field Guide is an exploration of the ways in which we discover and exchange knowledge that transform our experience of looking at the world.  Field guides transfigure the invisible to the seen, the foreign to the familiar. A field guide helps us differentiate and identify what is valuable from what could be dangerous.  In an era of ever-shortening attention spans, art can be a field guide to help us pay attention, to help us be astonished.  

Featuring work by Scott K. Adams, Maddie Aunger, Morgan Bakaletz, Xavi Bou, Kyle Brandt-Lubart, Casey Lance Brown, Ned Bustard + Every Moment Holy, Jennifer Colten, Joe Cory, Jessie Donovan, Aaron Ellison + Eric Zeigler, Carlynn Forst, Brittany R. Gilbert, C. Annie Hart, Sophia Hatzikos, T. Joy Hitchcock, Joanna Hoge, Bryce Holt, Adriane Honerbrink, Thomas Kiefer, David Lancaster, Sophia Mason, Katie North, Patricia Palmer, April Parviz, Michele Heather Pollock, Christopher Reiger, Hollie Regalo, Mike Roth, Anna Schenker, Natalie Schorr, Lynne Smith, and Michael Winters

Curated by Sarah Bernhardt

Field Guide Exhibition Catalog:

We invite you to come experience Field Guide by attending our Dovetail Reception on Tuesday, February 13, from 6-8pm!

The Women’s Chapel is an interdisciplinary art exhibition created by artist Megan Kenyon and a collaborative group of evangelical women. They are creating an incarnational space, one embodied in this community of people deeply hurt by evangelical Christian spaces but who continue to practice their faith in Jesus despite that hurt.

Inspired by feminist consciousness-raising groups and art installations from the 1970s, The Women’s Chapel shows up as the experiences shared in the group, and in artifacts of that sharing, which form the art exhibition. Using incarnation as an active verb, Kenyon and her group explore how prophetic imagination expresses itself in rage, lament, humor, and hope to illuminate and challenge the places where patriarchy lurks in church practice and co-opts the Gospel.

The work in this show predominantly takes the form of photography, collage, found sculpture, and text, making visceral the testimonies shared. The show features self-portraiture, as Kenyon wrestles with her own faith and response to uncovering patriarchy in institutions she trusted. It also features work created by the group through facilitated workshops and work Kenyon created in response to things shared by this group. Their work stands as a critique from the inside, and the exhibition, The Women’s Chapel becomes an open invitation to anyone who is willing to come and see.

In the spirit of our Dovetail receptions, Intersect Arts is partnering with Washington University’s John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics to host a panel discussion in conjunction with the exhibition The Women’s Chapel. Artist Megan Kenyon will be one of the guest speakers, and you won’t want to miss it! Click below to find out more and register for the event!

Dovetail Reception is October 3, 2023 from 6-8pm

From the Curator:

"There is nothing like a gleam of humor to reassure you that a fellow human being is ticking inside a strange face." –Eva Hoffman

 From physical humor to surreal absurdity, deadpan satire to macabre hyperbole, from low-brow to high-brow, puns or parodies, there are so many diverse outlets for this important function of human society, humor. But apparently humor is no joke. Research demonstrates its powerful capacity to create empathy and stimulate self-reflection. Humor, tied to the specifics of culture and combined with individual personality, creates a sharp double-edged sword that can—in one swoop—unite, and in another divide, at times bridging and at times delineating social boundaries.

Art museums and galleries parade as pantheons of preciousness and prestige—places where humor has not always been welcome. The art world has always thrived on creating in and out groups. Those who can and can’t. Those who get it, those who don’t. Those who play the game, those who undermine, and those who don’t give two hoots. From the historical relegation of artistic humor to political cartoons, to a contemporary palette for only irony and mockery, can we have a real, even joyful, laugh and still call something serious art?  Viewers and artists alike may struggle to navigate the line between sensitivity and not taking themselves too seriously. Can we find ways to experience art and humor as connective, rather than divisive? 

 This collection of artworks playfully explores various modalities of humor as artists engage a wide variety of topics in their pithy practices. Many artists invite you into challenging topics that might hit that funny bone.  Did you laugh?  Great. You didn’t laugh? That’s ok, that’s not necessarily the point anyway.  Whether you “liked” a particular style of humor or not, observe how the humor in that piece affected your posture towards considering the artist's deeper purpose. Observe how humor, no matter how feeble, or dumb, or witty, or strange, connected you to someone else. 

And please—do us a favor, even out of pity—laugh out loud just a little. 

Funny Bone is open from September 9 - November 4, 2023

Curated by Sarah Bernhardt

#funnyboneIAC

From the Curators:

Clothes: they unite us and distinguish us. Whether professionally required, functionally necessary, economically constrained, historically informed, or just for the love of the look, we end up developing our own style - a personal uniform. Our uniforms weave a visual language, composing an autonomous identity while aligning ourselves with like-minded peers and communities. We are also observers, deriving meaning from viewing someone else’s clothing.  We draw from a rolodex of memories and experiences that influence our stereotyping. What role does a viewer’s opinion play in the construction of our own identity? Does observation cause us to hide behind a uniform and instead project what we think people expect to see?

uniFORMity investigates the principles of style and these questions through the examination of five uniforms. To commemorate the last five years in this space, five fashion designers connected with five individuals who represent key partnerships integral to Intersect’s growth since its beginning in 2013. The designers collaborated with these individuals to create new uniforms inspired by their own traditional uniforms, professions, interests, and backgrounds.

Fashion is not limited to a brand name or the price tag but is a billboard of personalized expression. A quick glance at an outfit can become an exploration, uncovering beautiful complexities held by the wearer. As we attempt to better understand our relationship between clothes, observers, and wearers, we find that we FORM a unique community unified by our participation in style.

curated by Kasper Woldtvedt and Sarah Bernhardt

Exhibition Runs June 10th – August 20, 2023

#IACfashion5

May 1 - May 26

DOVETAIL RECEPTION : May 9TH | 6 - 8 PM

Here//Now is an intimate look at what kind of work is being produced in this place at this moment in time. Rather than being joined by any thematic concept, or media parameters, or (perhaps most importantly) professional ambitions, this exhibition asks what happens when work is brought together by physical proximity, of place, of being made next to one another here...now.  Artists who make and think and create in all the kinds of ways that contribute to the larger ecosystem of creative practices can find themselves segmented and segregated into the various niche markets and worlds. We perhaps find ourselves rarely occupying the same spaces at the same times with the same kinds of audiences. With work from artists all within the 63118 zipcode, the exhibition asks what sorts of learnings can come from a moment when we dismantle perceived hierarchies in the art world, to exist simultaneously, here and now.

Curated by Linnea Ryshke and Sarah Bernhardt 

#herenow23

January 23 - March 30

DOVETAIL RECEPTION : february 28th | 6 - 8 PM

After the spectacle of the sunset and before the promises of sunrise, the world is gradually cloaked in shades of blue. Blue hour. Neither night, nor day. Neither here, nor there. Both. And. This exhibition explores times of transition, liminal space, and metamorphosis. Change is one of the surest experiences of the human condition, and the hovering poetic moments both in and out of time, the blue hour, offers us a space to be fully present in the in-between. 

Works from over 50 artists across the country invite us to consider and connect with varied experiences and interpretations of the Blue Hour.

Featuring work by Brian Alexander, Marilynne Bradley, Madeline Brenner, Sally Brogden, Michele Borgarelli, Charles Bosco, Katie Calfee, Trevor Campbell, Youyun Chung, Bettina Cousineau, Jessica Curning-Kuenzi, Elaine Daily-Birnbaum, John DenHouter, Matthew Derezinski, Mark Dierker, Lauren Douglas, Andrea Ernest-Sheehan, Robert Eustace, Tracy Finn, Gigi Florek, Gloria Gale, Suzanne Glémot, Philip Harper, Emma High, Linda Jurkiewicz, Tom Koken, Kristi Kuder, Jordan Lienhoop, Craig Lloyd, Mia Loia, Justin M Millar, Lori Marble, Jeanne Marklin, Marjorie Jane McClelland, Brian Mitchell, Sara Nordling, Mark Pack, Magda Parasidis, Keith Pitts, Bill Russell, Jeff Schofield, Gayathri Seetharaman, Heather Sparkman, Barb Stahl, Richard P Stevens, Benita VanWinkle, Ed Whitmore, Rachel York & Ariel Zhang

Curated by Sarah Bernhardt

#bluehour23

DOVETAIL RECEPTION : february 28th | 6 - 8 PM

Heads, Faces, and Spiritual Encounter

A CIVA traveling exhibition

December 1 - January 2

Dovetail Reception : december 06 | 5 - 8 PM

What’s a Dovetail Reception?

In the history of the human race has there ever been an individual who has not drawn some simulate of a head or a face?  From the Neolithic Plastered Skull found in Jericho, Jordan to a child’s earliest markings in the 21st Century it is the face that captures the attention as we try to make sense of our world.  HEADS, FACES, AND SPIRITUAL ENCOUNTER draws on this fascination of the human heart and mind.

From noted artists such as Henri Mattise, Marc Chagall, Otto Dix, David Alfaro Siqueiros, Paul Wunderlich, Bernard Buffet, Georges Rouault, Eric Gill, Giovanni Castiglione, Karl Schmidt-Rottluff, Werner Drewes, and Leonard Baskin to self-taught artists such as Elder Anderson Johnson and Rodney Charles Hardee to anonymous African artists from Ife, Nigeria and the Dan Peoples with many known and lesser-known artists of high quality in between, this exhibition offers a thoughtful and enjoyable glance at the mystery of the human face.

It is hoped that in these forty some-odd works, differing in conceptions, styles and media, the viewer will find not only something that will arrest their attention aesthetically but also will intrigue them emotionally and intellectually. Furthermore, we dare hold the aspiration that after seeing HEADS, FACES, AND SPIRITUAL ENCOUNTER that the viewer will never again take the faces of family, friends and those around them for granted.

Atmospheric Perspective

September 12 - November 6th

Dovetail Reception : October 22 | 6 - 8 PM

What’s a Dovetail Reception?

Atmospheric Perspective, a historic painting term,  refers to the effect the atmosphere has on the appearance of an object as it recedes into the distance. As distance increases, contrast and detail decrease, and colors of the object become less saturated and hazy. In this group exhibition, contemporary artists from all over the U.S. contemplate this idea as some render the landscape in a traditional sense, and others posit atmospheric perspective as metaphor for thinking about our environmental moment from varied vantage points. 

Come celebrate and grieve and contemplate and wonder at these many visual perspectives and join the conversation about what living in and caring for our world, together, can look like.

FEATURING work by:

Carl Aspenberg, Brandin Barón, Michael Baum, Raymond Bonavida, Joseph Canizales, Joe Cory, Jacob Cotton, Preston Craig, Thomas Crawford, Robert Creighton, Peter Cullum, Mark Dierker, Kendall Dorman, Jessica Dunne, Gigi Florek, Joan E. Gardner, Brittany Gilbert, Nick Gripp, C. Annie Hart, Annieo Klass, Arthur Koch, Cindy Konits, Gregory Lookerse, Kaitlin Merchant, Kristin Nalesnik, Mark Neumann, Michelle Paine, Collier Parker, Nancey Price, Britt Sondreal, Michael E. Stern, Jeff Tamblyn, G. Jackson Tanner, Eduardo Valdes, Emily Wilker, Michael Winters, Stefan Zoller,

Curated by Sarah Bernhardt.

Regular Gallery Hours: M-F, 12-6pm

Exhibition runs through November 6th

DIGITAL CATALOG

(Physical catalogs available for free as a thank you gift to all visitors to the gallery)

Dovetail Reception : October 22 | 6 - 8 PM

“No settled family or community has ever called its home place an “environment.” None has ever called its feeling for its home place “biocentric” or “anthropocentric.” None has ever thought of its connection to its home place as “ecological,” deep or shallow. The concepts and insights of the ecologists are of great usefulness in our predicament, and we can hardly escape the need to speak of “ecology” and “ecosystems.” But the terms themselves are culturally sterile. They come from the juiceless, abstract intellectuality of the universities which was invented to disconnect, displace, and disembody the mind. The real names of the environment are the names of rivers and river valleys; creeks, ridges, and mountains; towns and cities; lakes, woodlands, lanes, roads, creatures, and people.”

— Wendell Berry

From the curator

To Love Home

I’m thinking of you, my love.  You linger, always, brimming in that space that feels like an ungraspable cloud at the back of my head. Sometimes you rise and preoccupy the front of my thin gray cortex, sitting right atop the bones of my eyebrows, catching my eye, igniting my imagination, your presence looming.  Sometimes you swell in my chest, squeezing the left side beneath my breast with clutches of wonder and affection.  Sometimes you travel deeper and lower and stir in me a worry, and a hope. Sometimes you grip the calloused and tender soles of my feet against the firmness and softness of your own body, of which I am a part, to which I belong, to which I want to tend well.

My love, I am not a scientist who understands the spectacular patterns of your design, the character of each molecule, or the cold calculations and equations that compose your rhythms and idiosyncrasies.  I am not a scholar who can recite your many names in Latin, or recount your eons or epochs, nor a philosopher to expound on your cosmology. I am not a politician with an agenda to prescribe or policy to enact. I am not a poet, nor really much of an artist able to articulate the matters of your profound beauty.  But I am a human.  And all humans have love. As I do for you. And love letters are the place to say that love can change the world.  

So my love, I have gathered for you, for us, this collection of memorials and musings—a collection of love really, that has been given form. These forms sing my admirations, investigations, ponderings, confessions, longings, and commitments.  These materialized visions that touch the sweeping arc of our intricate love story are assembled here in this small corner of time and space to be shared with all those who also occupy this place with us, right here, right now.

I have hope for our love story, my darling.  I’m so grateful for you, my magnificent wonder.

Love,

Sarah 

“You have been given questions to which you cannot be given answers. You will have to

live them out - perhaps a little at a time.'

And how long is that going to take?'

I don't know. As long as you live, perhaps.'

That could be a long time.'

I will tell you a further mystery,' he said. 'It may take longer.”

— Wendell Berry, Jayber Crow

More Thoughts:

To Love Home - A Letter from Sarah Bernhardt, Curator and Director - Intersect Arts Center

In the Peace of Wild Things: And Other Poems – Wendell Berry

Braiding Sweetgrass – Robin Wall Kimmerer

Center for the Care of Creation

Negative

June 6 - August 28 | M-F 12-6

DOVETAIL RECEPTION : August 16 | 6 - 9 PM

What first comes to mind when you hear the word “negative?” 

Contradiction? Rejection? Something upsetting? Something bad? 

What about negative space?  What is it about that dance of light and dark, of filled and unfilled space that can be so incredibly radiant?  Positive space cannot exist without its inverse.   

But what if negative space is not so negative?  What kind of radiance could negative space in daily life generate?  What kind of discovery could boredom yield? What kind of emptiness can facilitate fullness? 

Featuring work by April Behnke, Sarah Bernhardt, Kai Brisk, Tyler Brumfield, Elaine Buss, Leo Compliment, Ben DiNino, David Engbritson, Michelle Graf, Melissa Gwyn, Marcella Hackbardt, Thomas Hays, Sungchan Kim, Danice D Marshall, Ursula Minor, Brian Mitchell, Henry Moyerman, Emily Mueller, Greg Mueller, Stone Peng, Russell Prather, Katie Ries, Delaney Rogers, Gary Rubin, Kelly Schumacher, Michelle Schwengel-Regala, Peg Shaw, Matt Vars, Kaitlin Wilfing, Jeff C Williams, Dontavius Woody, Taylor Yocom, & Aly Ytterberg

Curated by April Parviz.

Exhibition runs : June 6 - August 28 | M-F 12-6

Dovetail Reception : August 16th | 6:00 - 9:00pm

More information

Exhibition Walk-Through

Seven remarkable women all pondering the work of “de” and “re” in some way have come together for this exhibition to share the poetry that is this lifelong, generational process of doing and undoing and doing. 

Of unlearning and remaking. 

Of leaving and becoming. 

Of holding cultural histories dear and forming new cultural contexts.

Of building new communities of individual and shared identities.

This exhibition of photographic work is an invitation to ponder the kinds of constructions that compose every aspect of our lives. This artwork is an invitation to wonder at our abilities as humans to deconstruct those things which do not serve us or our communities well, and the even more remarkable tenacity we have to reconstruct new possibilities for our future.  

Curated by Sarah Bernhardt

Catalog

Welcome!

Seven remarkable women all pondering the work of “de” and “re” in some way have come together for this exhibition to share the poetry that is this lifelong, generational process of doing and undoing and redoing. 

Of unlearning and remaking. 

Of leaving and becoming. 

Of holding cultural histories dear and forming new cultural contexts.

Of building new communities of individual and shared identities.

This exhibition is an invitation to ponder the kinds of constructions that compose every aspect of our lives. This artwork is an invitation to wonder at our abilities as humans to deconstruct those things which do not serve us or our communities well, and the even more remarkable tenacity we have to then reconstruct new possibilities for our future.   

I pray this invitation to look and listen, to delight, and grieve, and to wonder has opened even a small space within you to consider the constructions in the interior of your own psyche, the exterior of your communities,  and the larger sphere of social, political and physical constructions that may seem far outside your control.  I pray that we can take to heart Dillard’s quote, and that artists like these remarkable women have nurtured us toward reflecting on the ways in which we can build our days to construct more beautiful lives. 

Sarah Bernhart 

Curator

My work surveys the lives of Muslim refugees and immigrants from across the Balkan Diaspora. I contextualize the Bosnian-American relationship to the social, cultural and political identities inside xenophobic culture. I am interested in the construction of synthesized cultural identities as a result of the interplay between shared religious and political history with the effects of forced migration. 

I often turn the camera on my family to create subject matter. I employ historical research, memoir interviews and a range of disciplinary perspectives to raise social, political and personal questions: How does sociopolitical trauma affect the way we narrate ourselves? How do unbalanced power relations and privilege affect the social production of space? How do our ideals and visions of democracy engage with our notions of belonging?

My work depicts the confluence of contemporary and traditional values decontextualized from place and time. The image “Red Chair” resides in a newly renovated mosque with features—such as the repeat-patterned carpet—produced to resemble ancient islamic aesthetics. Nearly hidden to the side, a camera mounted to the wall inspects the looker. I am inviting the viewer to consider the continuous re-contextualization of space: is it an American mosque, a foreign mosque in America, or prying WASP American eyes overseeing a mosque? Much like the juxtaposition of the identities around the hyphen, the images express an imaginary landscape of multiculturalism.

A poem to compliment April’s photography

By Emily Harris

We’re suffering from a broken heart

Since seeing a dandelion as the most stunning piece of beauty outside our own ponytail

A lot has happened

We didn’t lay down our dancing because we were tired of dancing.

We did it because there was work to be done, and we were the ones for the job

It was our beautiful sense of responsibility; 

our capacity for compassion

We shouldered burden after burden, until we became burdened. We lost our connection to that dandelion and can’t find the beauty in our ponytail.

Both now, are weeds.

We look in the mirror in disgust at what we’ve ‘become’, without seeing the sacrifice, good intention and determined perseverance, that gave us our form

Return to play, 

to again recognize beauty

About the Artists

Natalie Christensen

Santa Fe, New Mexico photographer Natalie Christensen’s focus is on banal peripheral settings. Influenced by 25 years as a psychotherapist, her photos favor psychological metaphors. She deconstructs to color fields, geometry and shadow. “Sometimes I get a glimpse of the sublime in these ordinary places.” 

Christensen has exhibited in noted museums and galleries in the U.S. and internationally, was a UAE Embassy invitee for a UAE Architecture Delegation tour, has been invited as Artist-in-Residence to Chateau d’Orquevaux, France and a photobook, “007 – Natalie Christensen,” has recently been published by Setanta Books, London. She has guest lectured at the Royal College of Art and led photography workshops at The Royal Photographic Society, London and Meow Wolf, Santa Fe.

Christensen is the recipient of several prestigious photography awards, has work in permanent collections and publications include The Guardian, Creative Boom, The British Journal of Photography, Musee Magazine, Art Reveal Magazine and Aesthetica Magazine.

Website: www.nataliechristensenphoto.com

Instagram: @natalie_santafe 

Aïda Hasanović

Aïda Hasanović is a Bosnian-American artist and writer currently based in St. Louis, MO. Her work explores how different issues of memory and migration interact in the re-construction of a synthesized cultural identity. Her practice weaves from working in photography, bookmaking and video. Aïda’s recent work and research investigates how sociopolitical trauma and historical circumstances affect our notions of belonging. Hasanović’s work has been exhibited locally and nationally including the Contemporary Art Museum in St. Louis, SRLBX in Columbia and Cherry Gallery in Richmond, VA.

Website: www.aidahasanovic.com

Instagram: aida_hasanovic_

Tiffany J. Sutton

Photographer Tiffany J. Sutton was born in 1981 in Rochester, NY, and was raised in suburban St. Louis, MO. She began documenting family and friends after receiving a Kodak camera as a Christmas gift in the early 1990s. While primarily a self-taught photographer, she also attended classes at Washington University in St. Louis and St. Louis Community College. Sutton has decided to work with black women exclusively, as a way to reconnect with herself and discuss social movements. Sutton works with digital, film, and instant cameras. 

Website: www.tiffjtiffsutton.com

Instagram: @tiffanyjoy1955

Carol Lara 

Carol Lara is an award winning artist whose self-described style of “Grace and Grit” is exemplified through her fine art portraiture. Creating intimate portraits, bringing forth each subject’s authenticity is where she shines. Her subjects describe it best, saying her work leaves them feeling “speechless, yet liberated”.

Website: www.carollara.com

Instagram: @carollaraphotography

Facebook: www.facebook.com/carollaraphotography

Connie Flores

Connie Flores is a visual and UX designer born and raised in Houston, TX. She completed her BFA in Communications Design at Syracuse University and is currently based in St. Louis. Outside of design, Connie explores the idea of reflection, memories, and motivation using photography, illustration, and content creation.

Website: www.ConnieFlores.com

Instagram: @konacan

Brea Youngblood

Brea Youngblood is an artist, mystic, nature lover and mother. Her practice includes poetry, photography, voice and ritual creation, healing work, and bringing into being many projects and organizations. She grew up in a rural area and was homeschooled from the age of six, allowing her to lean into her eccentricities and deep spiritual practice. Her most regular collaborators are her son, the trees, the sky and whatever is blooming around her. She believes that art is more about a way of living than an object one creates.

Instagram: @breayoungblood

Emily Harris

I CREATE comfortable, washable skirts that allow women to transition through their many roles, as I transition through my roles of mother, wife and entrepreneur. My original patterns are drawn by hand. My fabrics are sourced responsibly. My skirts are sewn in my home studio. I CHALLENGE traditional fashion culture, and encourage women to discover and protect the truest version of themselves… By constructing wardrobes thoughtfully and responsibly over a long period of time, by dressing in ways appropriate to their roles to increase productivity and by working through image insecurities as a method of facing larger self-esteem issues. 

Website: www.MrsEmily.com

April Parviz

April is an on-again off-again sort of artist. The way a lot of artists seem to be. It looks like for now she may be on-again. She’s hoping to stay on for a while. But it’s hard when you’re a mother. It’s hard to pursue your own dreams and desires. Or at least we tell ourselves it’s hard. But if we stop telling ourselves that, we might open our eyes and see that we are in fact pursuing our own dreams and desires, we just didn’t recognize them. So… it seems April just is an artist. And you probably are too.

Website: www.AprilParviz.art

Instagram: @AprilParviz

About the curator: 

Sarah Bernhardt is a St. Louis based artist, educator, curator, and administrator.  She received her MFA from Washington University in St. Louis and taught at University of Missouri St. Louis, and St. Louis University. Bernhardt is the founder and executive director at Intersect Arts Center, an arts space dedicated to increasing accessibility to the arts and nurturing opportunities for people to care for one another across diverse communities. 

Website: www.SarahBernhardtArt.com 

POROUS

Works from the Field

Linnéa Ryshke

JANUARY 22 - MARCH 11, 2022

Gallery hours : Monday - Friday : Noon - 6PM

“Porous: Works from the Field,” features three series of artworks by visual artist and writer Linnéa Ryshke, which she created in response to visiting sites of human-animal interaction. The subsequent paintings, drawings, objects and poems are material records of her  empathy with the animals whom she encountered. Concerned over the wellbeing of animals whose lives humans disrupt, exert control over, and exploit for economic gain, Ryshke tasks her work in reconciling the alienated human-animal relationship and restoring respect and reverence for the animals with whom we live.

The show features works from her recently published book, Kindling, which centers on her experience working on an organic meat farm. In Kindling, Ryshke writes, “Art can seem frivolous when faced with unending assault on animal lives that has reached exponential proportions. Art will not save these lives or stop these systems. But it will do the quiet, slow, subterranean work. Art seeks, makes and shares meaning between us humans.” In engaging with her work, she invites us into this task of meaning-making, to participate in conceiving other ways to relate and care across species lines. 

When will we wake and realize these walls were, all along, only skin?

Linnéa Ryshke (American, born in 1993) creates mixed-media paintings, drawings, sculpture and poetry that seek to restore the value of nonhuman animals as kindred beings worthy of our adoration, respect, and empathy. She creates art objects that invite other humans to honor the enigmatic subjectivity of the fellow creatures with whom we share this earth-home. With her B.F.A. from Pratt Institute and M.F.A. from Washington University in St. Louis, she has been exhibited nationally and recently published her first book Kindling with Lantern Publishing and Media in September 2021.

www.reembodimentproject.com | Instagram: linnea_ryshke | Facebook Event

Again and Again by CIVA

DECEMBER 1, 2021 - JANUARY 14, 2022

Intersect Arts Center Gallery hosts a traveling exhibition curated by CIVA called, Again and Again. It runs December 1st thru January 14th. Gallery hours are Monday-Friday from noon to 6:oopm. (December 20-23 hours are 9-3. Gallery closed December 24 - January 2.)

Again and Again is a photography exhibition that invites recurring and fresh contemplation of the ordinary and extraordinary through the seasons of the Christian liturgical calendar.

Dovetail

SEPTEMBER 18 - NOVEMBER 14, 2021

The dovetail joint is ancient carpentry technique that predates written history. The technique, while simplistic, is extraordinarily strong,  aesthetically elegant, and can provide the structural framework for anything from a wooden drawer to an entire building. 

For this exhibition, the dovetail joint functions as a metaphor for exploring the work of collaborative makers. While the effort of collaboration can be simple or (more often) complex, when we create in reciprocity, the results can express extraordinary frameworks for stronger, more elegant ways of being, thinking, and appreciating together.

The exhibition features 26 works of diverse aesthetic sensibility and subject matter, all unified by the fact that they were created by more than one artist.

This exhibition is part of a larger series of programs at Intersect Arts Center that include partnerships with local chefs and culinary artists, musicians from the St. Louis Symphony, Leverage Dance Theater, and many others to create responsive interdisciplinary experiences that are accessible and inclusive of a very diverse audience. 

About the curators: Sarah Bernhardt is the founder and director of Intersect Arts Center. She received her MFA from Washington University in St. Louis and teaches at St. Louis University. Christina Schempf is a classical musician who holds a MM from New England Conservatory of Music, and collaborated in curating this exhibition. 

Exhibition runs September 18th - November 14th

Dovetail Culinary Reception - October 16th

In conjunction with the exhibition, Intersect is excited to present a culinary experience that pairs artworks from the exhibition with hors d’Oeuvres, pastries, and drinks created by local chef, Tai Davis. Gallery capacity will be limited to 50 guests per hour, and vaccination is required to attend. Tickets include admission to the Dovetail exhibition, 4 hors d’Oeuvres, 1 pastry, and 1 non-alcoholic drink and are available to purchase for $20 with an optional alcohol drink ticket for $10. Pay-what-you-wish tickets are available to EBT card holders, Intersect studio artists, and students. More information.

Ritual

MAY 17 - SEPTEMBER 5, 2021

Intersect Arts Gallery featured 117 works by 44 artists that explored the phenomenon of ritual. From the sacred to the mundane we contemplated rituals that were personal and corporate, ancient and contemporary, organized and completely of the artist’s invention, spiritual, religious, political and of daily life. We glimpsed rituals that referenced ideas of healing, connection, lament, promise, and protection. We saw rituals of repentance, resistance, and routine. 

Rituals feel superfluous in many ways. They are not necessarily necessary. You can eat lunch without ceremony, and it will still nourish your body.  Rituals can be practiced with a high degree of intentionality, or they may be absorbed into daily life by rote, carried on from the traditions of past generations.  You may have rituals so ingrained in you from birth that you hardly recognize them as separate from your DNA. You may have developed new rituals during this time of Covid.  You may love your rituals, you may loathe some of your rituals, you may roll your eyes at some forms of ritualization by others.   

These things that we do, these rituals, with ceremony and with repetition, they are not just habits. Rituals are the embellishment of necessity, the soul of why we do what we do. They are the distillation of a universe of intricate and expansive ideas often surpassing comprehension into a tangible, enact-able structure of gestures, words, and objects. They not only nourish our bodies, but are vital to nourish our minds and our souls. Our thriving does depend on them, whether we are conscious of it or not.

Featured artists:

Baum, Christine | Bouie, Anne | Brock, Jem | Clutter, Tyrus | Coronado, Dani | Crook, Tia | Dashti, Ivy | Davis, Rachel Andrea | DeCaen, Andrew | Eustace, Robert | Foster, Tori | Garcia, Lindsay | Gastler, Katherine | Guynes, Jason | Haydon, Kalin | Heimsoth, Joshua | Hill, Alexis | Holzbauer, Paige | Khouri, Tania | Kiran, Mario | Lund, Curt | Manderson, Don | Mannas, Carol | Marek, Tonia | Mason, Sophia | Meszaros, Lena | McKinley, Cara | Nordling, Sara | Ochniak, Alyse | Ordway, Eric | Parisca, Mariana | Pinto, Shelly | Rose, Jamie | Rosenberg, Allan | Ryshke, Linnea | Songer, MaKayla | Serkes, Melanie | Smits, Victoria | Terrar, David | Wilder, Aaron | Wu, Jenny | Wunrow, Jeff | The WYJ Creative | Zorn, Matt

Curated by Intersect’s Executive Director Sarah Bernhardt | The original conception of this exhibition was developed by artist and educator Abby Bennett.

Beauty, Strength, and Courage Exhibition

MARCH 8 - APRIL 23, 2021

This show was made possible by a grant from the Regional Arts Commission.

Beauty, Strength and Courage: An International Fashion Show

Here//Now 2021

JANUARY 18 - FEBRUARY 26, 2021

Here//Now is an intimate look at what kind of work is being produced in this place at this moment in time. Rather than being joined by any thematic or medium parameters, this collection of diverse creations is brought together by a geographic presence of being made at Intersect Arts Center, in 2021, St. Louis, MO USA.

After facing months of highly virtualized existence, this show serves as a reminder of place and the people gathered together in a place who are making work around a vast spectrum of ideas and aesthetics. Please enjoy seeing a slice of life from 18 artists, here in this place, in this moment of now.

The Beautiful

December 2 - December 23 2020

Intersect Arts Center Gallery hosted a traveling exhibition curated by CIVA called, “The Beautiful.”  It opened Wednesday December 2nd and ran til December 23rd.

About The Beautiful 

In his essay “The Weight of Glory,” C.S. Lewis suggests that beauty comes to us as “brightness, splendour, and luminosity.” We know that encounters with beauty are essential to human flourishing. Indeed, such experiences capture our imagination and animate our souls; they invite us to pause and consider the nature and meaning of our material world and the one who created it all. In the modern period, artists often had a conflicted relationship to beauty. On one hand, they were drawn to beauty’s sublime qualities. On the other, they realized that a superficial understanding of beauty could be either a means to avoid the world’s suffering or a charm that incites consumer desire. Nonetheless, our need for beauty remains. In the shadow of Adam and Eve’s fall from grace there exists what some describe as a “broken beauty” — beauty that still captures heart and mind but contends with the fallenness of our world. This exhibit gathers more than 35 contemporary works of art executed in a variety of media and genres that bear witness to beauty as it appears to us in the complex landscape of contemporary culture.

RESERVOIR

FEBRUARY 8 - APRIL 3, 2020

“The man who is wise, therefore, will see his life as more like a reservoir than a canal. The canal simultaneously pours out what it receives; the reservoir retains the water till it is filled, then discharges the overflow without loss to itself."
- Saint Bernard of Clairvaux

The exhibition seeks to curate a compendium of collective wisdom, struggle, lament, reflection, suggestion, healing, and hope as we all live out this precarious counterpoise of work and rest.

Curated by Sarah Bernhardt; founder and director of Intersect Arts Center.

ANEW

SEPTEMBER 7 - OCTOBER 4 2019

At the intersection of violence and healing there exists an opportunity to experience freedom through the possibility of new beginnings. In conjunction with the CommUNITY Arts Festival, Anew is situated at this intersection creating a space for dialogue, fresh perspectives, and call to action. Through juried call thirteen artists were assembled from the region to present the duality we experience every day, existing, between the reality of ever-present violence in our community and the ways we collectively address and support one another whilst making space for vision to see things anew.

The themes in Anew can be difficult to take in at times, as we all have felt the impact of gun violence, trauma, sexual assault, amongst other instances of violence. The ultimate goal within this exhibition is to address difficult topics while simultaneously providing a counter-image opportunity to even for a moment experience peace and optimism for our future.

Alexis Rivierre, MFA | Interdisciplinary Artist & Educator | Guest Curator

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This exhibition took place in collaboration with commUNITY Arts Festival, an interdisciplinary festival focused on Dance to activate conversations around community violence awareness and prevention.

ANEW Catalog

LAYERED PLACE

FEBRUARY 9 - APRIL 19, 2019

Curated by Charis Norell

The traditional landscape painting often contains a horizon line, recognizable landforms, and an idealized representation of Nature. Looking deeper, the historic use of the landscape mirrors the inner-state of that society's relationship to the political, religious, economic, and natural world around it. "Layered Place" invites viewers to reevaluate their definition of landscape, and consider the multiple "layers" of the multi-faceted modern landscape. This group exhibition delves into humanity's tumultuous relationship with Nature, visual metaphors for Place, social and cultural identity, family heritage, and way-finding. 

Layered Place Catalog

On “Layered Place:” 

Notes From the Curator

“All places are small worlds: the sense of the world, however, 

may be called forth by art....” 

Yi-Fu Tuan, Space and Place (1)

In planning this show, I often asked myself what constitutes “Place.” Is a place merely a physical “spot” in the surrounding landscape? Are places simply locations we visit, dwell in, vacation at, or return to? Could places be more than landmarks and points of reference? I began to think of the concept of Place as a state of mind--an element of our psyche. But if this is true, does Place then become a timeline-point of lived experience; a memory, a fiction? Yes. Yes to all and yes to none of the above. In each of the works selected for “Layered Place” lies an element of Place. Each artist, in their own way of wandering and wondering through making, presents a layer of Place and its irrevocable connection to being human.

I think certain places earn a capital “P.” For example, I could visit many places, but there is no Place like a home. Home is one of those capital-“p” Places. Home holds more than a physical dwelling place--even the word “home” itself cues certain sets of emotions to mind. Philosopher Dylan Trigg writes, “In a word, the places in which we live, live in us.” (2) Trigg tells of the role memory plays in ingraining a location into the mind. The physical place might weather, change, or disappear. Yet, in our memories of our experiences in that place, it remains “untouched,” and continues long after the physical place itself has changed. In a sense, Places are fictions we create; a for-better-or-worse “topia” within our minds. If Place can live inside of me through my memories, perhaps the place now becomes an irreplaceable part of my own experience of my identity in the world around me. 

I am thrilled to have you join us at the Intersect Arts Center. As you walk through this exhibition, I invite you to listen and consider what layers of Place each work might be sharing. 

————

(1) Tuan, Yi-Fu. Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1977, p. 421

(2) Trigg, Dylan. The Memory of Place: a Phenomenology of the Uncanny. Athens, Ohio: Ohio University Press, 2012, p 33.

Works: 

4. Mandy Pedigo  | Gathering (Series) | Dried lichen, handwoven fabric, glass beads, linen, cotton, rayon and mixed fibers. | 10” x 10” | 2017

“My great grandparents came to this country from Finland, and in the span of one generation much of their culture and language faded from my family. Even in the effort to assimilate to American culture, traces of heritage remained to be handed down. Through the process of my making, I’ve realized this knowledge has passed unexpressed to me.

Researcher Pauline Boss studies the effects of immigration on families and the loss that results when one leaves home to travel and settle in a new place. She writes, “Homesickness was an essential part of my family’s culture. I think it may be true for all immigrant families, but it certainly was for mine. And it was even in the village because there were many immigrant families there.”

Much of my work functions as maps; maps tell us how to get to our destinations, describes the details of a particular place and how to orient ourselves to our surroundings. Maps evolve in response to changes to place, terrain and land use. Like maps, our memories change over time; the image we retain of a location seldom matches its actual character. The Finns have deep cultural connections with nature. It is no wonder that my family came to America and settled in an area that resembles Finland in many ways. My family carried a surname that translates from Finnish as “the land endures.” The work that I create echoes my family’s historic bond with land as well as the new ones I have formed in experiencing different places.

As weaving and stitching are all naturally slow processes, my work engages time. Working slowly is a direct opposite to the pace of our present culture. Slow allows for quiet, time to think, to meditate and to fully engage with tasks and ideas.”

FIRST FRUITS

JANUARY 14 - FEBRUARY 1, 2019

a Traveling Exhibition by CIVA

The entire Judeo-Christian narrative is filled with images of feasting, fruitfulness, and faithful labor. This exhibition explores the concept of “first fruits”, an ancient tradition of sacrificial yielding back to God the best portion of life’s blessings in gratitude. 24 Contemporary artists from around the country have undertaken the task of reflecting this idea in literal, metaphorical, personal, historical, and cultural contexts.

CIVA thanks Joel Sheesley for serving as the juror for this exhibition, a daunting task given the unusually large number of submissions. Sheesley is a painter and Emeritus Professor of art at Wheaton College. He currently works with The Conservation Foundation in northeastern Illinois, painting the Fox River Valley landscape, where he contributes a valuable aesthetic dimension to the foundation’s overall concern for environmental education. Joel’s paintings have been exhibited widely and upcoming shows for 2016-2017 include the Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, Kalamazoo, Michigan; the Lubeznik Center for the Arts, Michigan City, Indiana; and the Walford Galleries at Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois.

CIVA stands for Christians in the Visual Arts. It is an American visual arts organization working to enhance and explore the relationship between Christian faith and the visual arts. It was founded in 1979.

RESOLVE

AUGUST 3 - OCTOBER 5, 2018

We all want to find resolution to life’s challenges. I sought insights, perspectives, and artistic solutions to the dysfunctions and divisions which sadly and, ironically, unify every human being’s experience.  Artists from St. Louis and around the country submitted work of remarkable depth and breadth, each with a unique interpretation of the theme Resolve.  Packages rolled into the studio, the exhibition design ensued, and gradually the visual and conceptual connections started to thread together.  Throughout this program you can read the artists’ own words narrating their content and intent.  I’ve also offered a conceptual piece, a third-party interpretation of the art that can serve as a mediator.  So often contemporary art can be elusive and confusing and we can feel foolish for not “getting it,” even for those of us professionally trained in art. The notes here are intended to reconcile you through that conflict, to experience the beautiful, challenging, and poetic ideas contained within each work of art here. Each color and material and choice the artist has made carries meaning, and my intention is to offer at least one perspective of how that meaning might be interpreted.  Some works are more readily understandable than others, and others take patience, effort, and an investment of time and mental or emotional energy to gather the richness they have to offer.  You may not agree with every perspective here, but we invite you into one of the fundamental aspects of conflict resolution: listening.  Thank you for sharing these images with us, listening to the artists’ thoughts and perspectives, entering into conflict, and hopefully leaving with a more enriched and fuller understanding of resolution sought, aspired, and achieved. 

Sarah Bernhardt | Exhibition Curator | Executive Director, Intersect Arts Center

RESOLVE Catalog